January 2nd , 1943 .
I set sail from Lorient with my "Blackcat" , heading for Grid BD 67 .
But I am not happy ...
For reasons unknown to me , Kriegsmarine has decided not to give me the Torpido load chosen by me during briefing .
I find myself without any Acoustic Torps , Fat 1 are unavailable and all I have to sink ships with my VII-B is 6 TIs and 8 TIIIs .
Have they lost their trust in me ?..
Or is it because of my habit to go after Destroyers ?..
I do not know .
Fighting against the Royal Navy was already hard enough , but now that the US Navy is taking part more and more every day , I found Kriegsmarine 's decision regrettable , to say the least ...
I actually wrote a personal note to Admiral Donitz to inform him of my anger and frustration .
Furthemore , I had an old battle to resume in Grid AL 35 where I almost lost my boat to the RN , and I was hoping ~requesting I should say~ that Kriegsmarine send me again in the same area as everybody knows that English battleships almost always patrol the same area for months .
I suspect that they don 't like theirs Cpt. to take things on the personal level , but again I strongly disagree . The fact is that my own crew was waiting to get back there as well , and for the same reason .
History is not repeating itself it seems ...
...
I wasn 't more than 120nm away from Lorient when the first Air attack occured . 2 catalinas came at us from nowhere .
"Crash dive" !
Re-surfaced 2 Hrs later when my sonar boy heard a faint echo at our starboard , long range .
It ended up being a lone small English tanker, probably empty as it was making 16 Kts (!)
We pushed the engine to full ahead at 19 Kts , and slowly but surely closed on it .
At 3800m , I matched its speed and order my watch officer to get the deck gun ready , explosive shells loaded .
11 rounds later , the Sea was quiet again .
One down .
Nothing else until our arrival on Grid Patrol .
...
3 days later , still nothing on the horizon ...
Crew is playing Chess or cards and fruit juices are going down faster than usual ...
...
Enough of this . After a long talk with my No 1 , we decide to sail North , direction Grid AK 38 where we 've been few months ago .
It is a Grid where Convoys from Halifax are sailing to Liverpool .
With a bit of luck , we should be able to get some tonnage .
We found 2 more little tankers on the way . Weather was not on our side and I had to use Torpidoes to sent them to the bottom .
We then spent 2 days on Grid AK 38 , searching around for targets but no luck . Where are they for cry out loud !
Diesel was now getting low . Time to head SSE , direction BE 33 , near the English coast . Choosing this area is a bit of a risky business in early '43 as the RAF is heavily patroling those coastal waters , but we need some tonnage .
I do not want to go back to Lorient with only 3 enemy ships sank . That would be a shame ! Especialy with 11 Torps left onboard .
All the lads at "Le Chat Noir" would laught at us ...
...
Our journey to Grid BE 33 was ...awefull ! Very bad weather , huge waves , rain , and lightnings striking the Sea relentlessly . The watch crew hated it .
And that bloody fog at night ...
Even the skies are against us ...
When the weather became better , we had our first contact for days .
"Aircrafts spotted !"
"Crash dive !"
Sometimes , you really ask yourself what you did to the Gods to deserve such punishment ...
To cut it short , we didn 't see a single vessel for 3 more days and we had to crash dive at leats once a day
"Cpt. , we 're low on fuel "
Alright , back to base . *$&()%^%£ !!!
The last day was a beautifull day , like mid July . But we 're in February and without any fuel ...
...
To my surprise , on arrival to Lorient , I 've learned that I have been promoted to Ltn. Commander !!
Apparently , I 've sunk more than 500.000 tons in 34 months and 19 Patrols .
I told you , sometimes you have to ask yourself ...
:hmm:
B. Goelf out .
Cheers .